cheap_thoughts:Koodz: At least they let him cancel. I remember Verizon charging me $200 to cancel my father's cell phone even after I brought them a copy of the death certificate.

You're not responsible for your parents debt.

No but If his dad has assets that were going to get passed on to him and he didn't want $200 to turn into $2000 + penalties/interest and a lawsuit against dads estate that would hold up its disposition it may be a good idea.

MythDragon:This is a little off topic, but I need to vent.So I lose power due to the latest storm in VA. Lots of huge old trees, so when the wind blows stuff starts coming down and knocking out lines. Power goes out (ours did before the storm even started) and stays out for a while. Last major storm it was 8 days. (luckily my service line is still attached this time) Not to worry, I've got a generator to keep me up in cold Cokes and Xbox, but a limb took out my cable line. So no TV shows. But I've got the last three episodes of Revolution, 2 of Defiance, and a couple MLPs to watch. Wait, what's this? No signal apparently means my Goddamn DVR won't even turn on. It has power, I can hear things humming, but the power button does nothing. I un/replug it, and it goes through the boot process, gets as far as the Cisco screen, and then takes a shiat.

Apparently Comcast has decided, that if you don't have their express "OK" pinging into your machine 24 hours a day, you don't get to use their stuff. Not even to watch shows you *already* recorded. I guess this is so you can't take a DVR full of quality shows over to a friends house and let him get away with seeing something for free? Fark you, Comcast. It's bad enough that it takes 5 Goddamn days for you to fix the cablelines AFTER the power comes back, I would at least like to watch the shows I already have.

/And to think this is the route Xbox 1 is going...//End rant.

*really easy solution*

as long as you have cable (I don't bother anymore), all you need is a TV card or usb coax adapter for either a laptop or a desktop. Dump a large hard drive in there, and Windows 7 and up have a pretty good DVR already built in called Windows Media Center.

The TV card will come with a remote, so it'll probably be *better* than the crappy Comcast DVR. Hell, you could even burn the shows off to a DVD or CD at that point.

All you have to do is hook the HDMI from the TV to either an HDMI out on your motherboard, or get a DVI to HMDI cable.

*even easier solution*

get a Roku or some other box like that (I haven't used them, but I've heard they are nice). -It's the same concept as above, but most of the work is done for you already.

Dahnkster:Where in the article does it say the guy has insurance? We don't know if he was renting the home or was an owner as far as I can tell. But you sure seem hellbent on tongue-punching DirecTV's fart box. Good for you. Next time you should get some long pants when your mom buys you a suit. You're a big boy now. Yes you are. Who's a big boy? You're a big boy.

And since when does a lack of insurance forgive people of their debts? Renter's insurance is like $15/month.

It's up to the lessor to decide whether they want to forgive the value of destroyed in the possession of the lessee. If you want to see this as me kissing some company's ass, I guess that's fine.

d23:well damn me to hell for thinking that basic humanity and common sense should trump a contract! Whoo wee!

This guy wants to pocket the insurance money that covers the rented shiat in his house, instead of paying the owners of the aforementioned rented shiat. You don't have to be a corporate shill to realize that's both fraudulent and wrong.

Dahnkster:Stop making sense. You'd better get with the program citizen. Bow down before your corporate betters. DirecTV is your friend. How do you ever expect the poors to learn personal responsibility and boot-strappiness? After all, fires are an act of God.

This is a little off topic, but I need to vent.So I lose power due to the latest storm in VA. Lots of huge old trees, so when the wind blows stuff starts coming down and knocking out lines. Power goes out (ours did before the storm even started) and stays out for a while. Last major storm it was 8 days. (luckily my service line is still attached this time) Not to worry, I've got a generator to keep me up in cold Cokes and Xbox, but a limb took out my cable line. So no TV shows. But I've got the last three episodes of Revolution, 2 of Defiance, and a couple MLPs to watch. Wait, what's this? No signal apparently means my Goddamn DVR won't even turn on. It has power, I can hear things humming, but the power button does nothing. I un/replug it, and it goes through the boot process, gets as far as the Cisco screen, and then takes a shiat.

Apparently Comcast has decided, that if you don't have their express "OK" pinging into your machine 24 hours a day, you don't get to use their stuff. Not even to watch shows you *already* recorded. I guess this is so you can't take a DVR full of quality shows over to a friends house and let him get away with seeing something for free? Fark you, Comcast. It's bad enough that it takes 5 Goddamn days for you to fix the cablelines AFTER the power comes back, I would at least like to watch the shows I already have.

Babwa Wawa:Mr. Coffee Nerves: Slightly off-topic, but doesn't it seem like most of the personal satellite dishes are attached to mobile homes and cheap apartments? Maybe it's just me. I rarely see the things in newer developments but when I drive through town some of the older houses chopped up in to Section 8 apartments have so many dishes it looks like a branch office for SETI.

I think it's the density of those places that make you notice. More dishes/sq foot.

People that live in nicer places tend to make better decisions too, in general. A nice apartment dweller is far more likely to go visit their management office before installing a dish. When they get told that they have to put a $500 deposit down, do the wiring stuff I mentioned, and confine it to their patio (which has no guarantee of even being able to get reception) or they dcould ya know just call the cable company and be done, they usually just call the cable company. In the event that they just do whatever the fark they want and install it anyways, those types of tenants are much more capable of paying damages so the landlords will go after them and threaten/evict over violating the lease.

When you are dealing with tenants paying damn near nothing to live in some shiathole, they tend to do stupid stuff like just stick it up and worry about it later, or showup one day with 5 pit bulls. The landlord in this case is a little more farked. If damage has occurred it already has. He can now issue a lease violation, charge back a deposit, and pursue an eviction if they don't pay it (which most won't or can't). Now he can refuse rent, file a case with the court, hire an attorney, and lose another few months before it all is settled with the court and he has a new tenant. Plus at this point the tenant is going to be pissed, trash the place, and waste hours of employee time in dealing with this entire affair. Then after he gets a judgement he might get lucky to garnish $25 or $50 a month to pay for this thousands of damage. In a lot of places he also has to pay to refile that judgement every so often which may not even cover what he is getting. It frankly just makes more sense not to go after poor tenants for a lot of shiat that you wouldn't hesitate to enforce against richer ones, and the poorer ones tend to create those types of issues a hell of a lot more often.

If you are renting upscale apartments tenants are pickier too, a lot of them think the dishes look awful and as a owner/manager they won't want their property not looking great. A shiathole tenant commonly just is looking for some place that will accept his/her application and couldn't care less if it looks like a communication center.

MooseUpNorth:He should. At least in Canada, banks tend to require insurance (with the bank as beneficiary) as a condition for granting that mortgage. House burns down, insurance pays off the mortgage, everybody walks away.

That's not exactly forgiving the mortgage. They're getting their money. As stated many times before upthread - that's what insurance is for.

Even after personal tragedy, life goes on, and books have to balance. I'll say it again - that's precisely what insurance is for.

Mr. Coffee Nerves:Slightly off-topic, but doesn't it seem like most of the personal satellite dishes are attached to mobile homes and cheap apartments? Maybe it's just me. I rarely see the things in newer developments but when I drive through town some of the older houses chopped up in to Section 8 apartments have so many dishes it looks like a branch office for SETI.

Its a few things. People get behind on their cable, so switch to direct tv. They then get behind on that, and switch to dish, they then get behind that and switch to something else.

also, until recently, you got far more international channels on sat then you did on cable. My cable company now offers packages with a crapton of spanish, etc channels, so that may not be as big of a driver anymore.

Also someone in a decent place is probably going to put a little thought into where they stick their dish for aesthetics if they do have sat, as opossed to a guy living in a trailer who is just going to stick it wherever it is easiest. I originally wanted to get it in my place, but the only place I had LOS was right off my terrace, and I didn't want to stare at that thing every time I sat outside.

I can see both sides of this. It's an uncommon problem, but due to the number of dishes out there it happens enough to justify rewriting the contract a bit. $400 is cheap compared to a little PR damage here and there. Most customers trying to decide what provider to go with will latch onto any information they've heard or can easily Google. Right or wrong, it's in DirectTV's best interest to absorb things like this. Besides, it's not like they still don't get to write off the inventory loss.

Yes, your insurance, (homeowners or renters, you are responsible and spend the like 75 bucks a year for renters insurance, right?) will take care of it, which is why direct tv will bill you. If they did not, anyone who wanted to get out of any contract ever could just make up some sob story, and companies would then have to play detective on everything.

Koodz:At least they let him cancel. I remember Verizon charging me $200 to cancel my father's cell phone even after I brought them a copy of the death certificate.

Why shouldn't they? They are no different than any other creditor, be it a credit card, a mortgage, whatever, that the estate is OBLIGATED to pay out. Had your father died destitute, or had mr burnt dish mcdish been destitute, there are procedures in place to essentially say, "hey, we got nothing left to pay you with" to disolve the debt.

Lets say your dad owed 100k on his mortgage. Should the bank just say, "wow, sucks he is dead, we will forget about the 100k he owed us, enjoy the house!"